OGLC And Accessibility - iSchool Presentation. March 12, 2010

Ontario Government Libraries Council

Peter Marques, Head Librarian, Ontario Workplace Tribunals Library. [email protected] iSchool panel on the AODA and its impact on libraries. March 12, 2010.

Accessibility and the OGLC

Goals and Realities

1



AODA - Accessibility for Ontarians withDisabilities Act, 2005

Reg 429/07 -January 1, 2010 and the Public Sector

And What About Library Services

OGLC – Our Experiences

2

What I’ll be talking about…



AODA – What is a disability…

AODA uses the same definition of "disability" as the Ontario HumanRights Code, including both visible and non-visible disabilities. In theAct, "disability" means:

• any degree of physical disability, infirmity, malformation or

disfigurement that is caused by bodily injury, birth defect or illness and, without limiting the generality of the foregoing, includes diabetes mellitus, epilepsy, a brain injury, any degree of paralysis, amputation, lack of physical coordination, blindness or visual impediment, deafness or hearing impediment, muteness or speech impediment, or physical reliance on a guide dog or other animal or on a wheelchair or other remedial appliance or device

• a condition of mental impairment or a developmental disability,

3




• a learning disability, or a dysfunction in one or more of the processes involved in understanding or using symbols or spoken language,

• a mental disorder, or • an injury or disability for which benefits were claimed or received

under the insurance plan established under the Workplace Safety and Insurance Act, 1997

4




Types of disabilities:• Vision• Hearing• Physical• Intellectual• Developmental• Learning• mental health• speech or language• deaf-blind

5



AODA – The numbers behind the Act…

• About 1.85 million people in Ontario have disabilities; 15.5% of Ontario's population

• Aging population, number of Ontarians with a disability will increase

• projections show that in 2025 majority of persons with disabilities will be 65+ years of age

• Unemployment rate 5 times as high - untapped labour market potential

• Spending power $21-25 billion a year• Learning to better serve people with disabilities is good for business

and community.

6



AODA – The 2025 vision…

• Fully accessible Ontario by 2025• Only jurisdiction in Canada to have legislation that establishes a

comprehensive goal• First jurisdiction in the world to move from complaints-based

legislation to a regulatory model in the area of mandated accessibility

• Private sector in compliance to Reg 429/07 by 2012• Only jurisdiction in the world requiring both Public and Private

sector compliance for customer service

7



AODA – It’s all about standards…

• Ontarians with Disabilities Act, 2001 (ODA) was about planning, and the accessibility planning for government and broader public sector still applies

• ODA had no standards; limited enforcement• AODA is about accessibility standards• Establish enforceable standards with timelines for compliance in

accessing goods, services• buildings and employment standards will allow for the integration

of accessibility into regular business and capital planning

8



AODA – It’s all about standards…

• Accessibility standards are completed or currently being developed in 5 key areas:– Customer Service– Built Environment– Employment– Information and Communications– Transportation

• Standards Development Committees: inclusive and consensus-based, involve: People with Disabilities; Representatives of Industries and Economic Sector; Ontario Government Ministries; Public Consultation

9



Reg 429/07…

• Accessibility Standards for Customer Service Regulation (O. Reg. 429/07) is the first accessibility standard under the AODA - it came into force January 1, 2008

• Applies to all organizations that provide goods or services to the public or other organizations in Ontario and have at least 1 employee

• Timetable for compliance and reporting:– Public Sector [Libraries], January 1, 2010, and Org. must file a report in 2010– Private Sector [Libraries], January 1, 2012 - Org. must file report depending on

number of employees

10



Reg 429/07…

Requirements include:• Establish policies, practices and procedures on providing goods and

services to people with disabilities• Use reasonable efforts to ensure that policies, practices and

procedures are consistent with the key principles of independence, dignity, integration and equality of opportunity

• Communicate with a person with a disability in a manner that takes into account their disability

• Accomodate service animals, support person; communicate / notify when facilities or services are unavailable

11



Reg 429/07…

Requirements include:• All staff receive training (training policy); front line to policy

development • Must provide a process to receive and respond to feedback• Communicate with a person with a disability in a manner that takes

into account their disability• Policy to accomodate service animals, support person, and assistive

devices• Procedures to communicate / notify when facilities or services are

unavailable

12



Reg 429/07…

Organizations and businesses with 20 or more employees must:• Document in writing all our policies, practices and procedures for

providing accessible customer service and meet other document requirements set out in the standard.

• Notify customers that documents required under the customer service standard are available on request.

• When giving information / documents required under the customer service standard to a person with a disability, provide the information in a format that takes into account the person’s disability.

• Unless exempted by regulation, all organizations and businesses must file an accessibility report.

13



And what about library services…

Public sector libraries falling under the January 1, 2010 complianceUmbrella.Customer Service• Use of terminology, e.g.

– Confined to a Wheelchair, use "A person who uses a wheelchair– Normal, use "A Person without a disability“– Physically Challenged, use "A person who uses a walker / mobility aid", "a

Person with arthritis"...

• See a full list to Choose the Right Word as provided by the Ontario Government.

14




Customer Service

• Bet attentive to the specific needs, e.g.– Identify yourself when you approach a person and speak directly to the person

with a disability: e.g. not to the support person– Ask before you help; library materials in large print; procedures for Braille– Don't touch devices, e.g. wheelchairs, mobility devices– Provide information about accessible features of immediate environment– Procedures for accessing / retrieving stack materials

15




Customer Service

• Bet attentive to the specific needs, e.g.– Assisting someone with mental health disabilities; see recent AALL article

about Law Libraries and serving persons with mental health disabilitiesLearning disabilities

– take your time, patience, let the individual identify how best to provide service in a way that works for them

– Don't touch devices, e.g. wheelchairs, mobility devices– TTY; and audio format for people with a vision, – intellectual or developmental, or learning disability who are unable to read

print

16




Information and CommunicationsProvide assistive technologies for public / visitor workstations, e.g.• Screen readers• Captions for audio portion of video tutorials; screen casts • Alternative input devices: alternative keyboards; touch screens• Screen enlargers / magnifiers• Speech recognition or voice recognition programs: allow people to

give commands and enter data using their voices• Text-to-speech synthesizers• Talking and large print Word processors• TTY• Braille translation programs

17




Your Web ServicesBuild sites, web services using web accessibility standards andprinciples of design, e.g.• Sites which address vision disabilities (blindness, colour-blindness,

vision loss); • Hearing disabilities; • Disabilities which impact motor skills (inability to use a mouse, slow

response time, limited fine motor control); • Cognitive disabilities (learning disabilities, distractibility, inability to

remember or focus on large amounts of information)

18




Your Web ServicesHow…• Alternative text - provides a textual alternative to non-text content

in web pages. It is especially helpful for people who are blind and rely on a screen reader to have the content of the website read to them

• Table Headers - tables that are used to organize tabular data should have appropriate table headers (the <th> element). Data cells should be associated with their appropriate headers, making it easier for screen reader users to navigate and understand the data table

• Links - every link should make sense if the link text is read by itself. Screen reader users may choose to read only the links on a web page. Certain phrases like "click here" and "more" must be avoided

19




Your Web Services• Caption and/or provide transcripts for media• Accessibility of non-html documents; structure your Word and

Office documents for accessibility• Design to standards outline by WAI and W3• Clear Language and Design - use clear fonts, and use headings and

lists appropriately• JavaScript - make JavaScript event handlers are device independent

(e.g., they do not require the use of a mouse) and make sure that your page does not rely on JavaScript to function

20




Your Web Services• Allow users to skip repetitive elements on the page - provide a

method that allows users to skip navigation or other elements that repeat on every page, e.g. "Skip to Content“

• Forms - make sure all form elements (text field, checkbox, dropdown list, etc.) has a label and make sure that label is associated to the correct form element using the <label> tag

• Setup library-wide policies, procedures, and standards to ensure these web accessibility standards are followed

• ...accessibility and the mobile web, new services (eReaders, iPads)

21




Your DocumentsDo you do deliver Word docs in your research work for clients; do youdeliver answers via e-mail...then you'll have to Structure yourDocuments• Use true styles in Word. For example, when creating a

heading, don't simply change the font, enlarge the font size, make it bold, etc. If this is done, the document has no real structure that can be discerned by a screen reader. In Word, the correct way to provide structure is to use Word style.

22




Your DocumentsSetup guidelines fro structuring Office documents (or whatever yourlibrary works with), and this includes e-mail.• For e-mail, Html and Plain Text are best, but choosing one over the

other depends on whether you're using links: Html best to use if you're including links in the e-mail, but for screen readers to provide useful information to the user you need to ensure that the link is embedded in text instead of simply providing the urlSetup your e-mail replies / responses so that the inserted text can be differentiated from the original text

23




Your DocumentsThe PDF Dilemma:• Many people involved in developing Accessibility policy and

standards for AODA see PDF as non-accessible document format...it simply doesnot "screen read" like Word or Html.

• Adobe claims to have provided features built into Acrobat (eg. tagging of document) which allows PDF documents to be accessed with assistive technology: see Accessing PDF Documents with Assistive Technology: A Screen Reader User's Guide

• Our library, and many Ontario Government services, provide all documents to be downloaded in either 2 of the 3: Word, PDF, or Html

24




Policy & Planning• Library managers need to now consider accessibility with regard to

procurement activities or planning for future development (e.g. physical space, building codes, etc.)

• Are the vendors you work with developing products which meet accessibility standards; think of the ILS industry

• Create a record of vendors who provide goods and services which meet accessibility standards

• Recruitment and employment standards

25



OGLC’s experience…

Who We Are• The Ontario Government Libraries Council (OGLC) was established

to strategically support the Government of Ontario and to assist and advocate for libraries and librarians working in information management services within the Government of Ontario.

• OGLC provides a platform for Ontario Government Libraries to discuss, collaborate, plan, and advocate for information management initiatives which improves the management and sharing of information both within and outside of the Government.

26




Dealing with the “Realities”• The OGLC established the "OGLC Working Group on

Accessibility(AODA) Best Practices“• Our role is to keep our members informed of the issues and new

developments, and to explore possible solutions / options and provide recommendations

• About 32 Libraries / Resource Centres, etc (last time I counted), many quite different in org. setup (virtual, 1 staff to 60 staff),

• Providing different level of services: e.g. my library (the OWTL) serves both the public and government, many don't.

27




Dealing with the “Realities”• Different Funding and Corporate planning structures (Ministries,

clusters, ABCs) can slow progress towards accessibility standards compliance: e.g. many libraries don't have a screen reader, screen magnifier, and other assistive technology installed on the client / public / visitor stations

• Our role is to keep our members informed of the issues and new developments, and to explore possible solutions / options and provide recommendations

• Guidelines and procedures on how to deal with requests for Ministry / library documents in braille...not readily available

28




Dealing with the “Realities”• We hope to Identify the common and unique accessibility concerns

of our members, and help them work toward some solution • Provide and maintain an online directory of key resources, tools,

and documents related to accessibility and libraries• Help build “templated” policies, procedures, guidelines which we

can share with all our OGLC members• Keep on-top of the standards, accessibility literature, resources, and

tools, and get together regularly to discuss next steps…

29



Thanks…

If you have any questions please feel free to contact me:

Peter [email protected] Workplace Tribunals LibraryOGLC Working Group on Accessibility (AODA) Best Practices

Presentation available on SlideShare athttp://www.slideshare.net/owtlibrary

30

OGLC And Accessibility - iSchool Presentation. March 12, 2010

Education

Transcript of OGLC And Accessibility - iSchool Presentation. March 12, 2010